Google has admitted that some complex Android apps and games can run poorly on Intel-powered Googlebooks without extra developer tuning.
According to Engadget the snag comes from the basic architecture mismatch. Most Android software was built for Arm processors, while Intel Googlebooks have to translate that code for x86 hardware.
Google said: “The vast majority of Android apps run smoothly across both Intel and Qualcomm Googlebooks right out of the box. Because many Android apps were originally designed for Arm chips, a small handful of complex apps or games need some developer tuning to run their best on Intel-based platforms. We’re working hand-in-hand with app developers, Intel, and Qualcomm to continuously optimise performance and expand compatibility across the entire portfolio.”
Google has been keen to pitch Googlebooks as machines that play nicely with Android smartphones and can pull Android software directly from the Play Store.
That remains true, but Chipzilla-powered models carry an extra layer of technical baggage. Android apps written for Arm have to pass through a hardware translation layer before they can run on x86 Googlebooks. Google has previously acknowledged that translating and executing Arm code on x86 Chromebooks can reduce both performance and battery life.
Apps compiled natively for x86 avoid those penalties, but Google has not said which Android apps are causing trouble or precisely what goes wrong when they do.
The company maintains a curated collection of Googlebook-optimised apps, although it has previously stressed that optimisation is not required before software can be downloaded from the Play Store.
There are currently three Intel Core 5 Googlebooks from Acer, Asus and Lenovo. Dell and HP have gone down the Arm route instead, using Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite.
That split should make the first wave of Googlebooks rather more interesting than Google’s compatibility pitch suggests, particularly if real-world testing exposes noticeable gaps in performance or battery life between translated x86 apps and native Arm builds.
